Sheboygan racer finds tougher traffic
French moves to top sports-car division
James French won a Rolex and dominated a sports-car class. On the track, 2017 couldn’t have gone much better for him.
But the calendar has flipped.
IMSA’s old PC class is gone completely.
And if French and his teammates are going to win even one race — forget about the seven they’d need to match last season — they’ll have to beat a much larger field of cars and such newcomers as Indianapolis 500 winners Helio Castroneves and Juan Pablo Montoya.
“We’re all here for the same reason,” said French, a 25-year-old Sheboygan native. “I don’t think we would do it if we didn’t think we had a chance.
“But it means a lot more has to be in our favor. We just have to do our absolute best to have a chance to win. Our expectations are the same, but there’s a lot more required from us to get the same result.”
French teamed with Patricio O’Ward last year to dominate a class that was decimated in its impending extinction. The three teams that remained were all strong, but Performance Tech Motorsports quickly established itself as the best.
Although Performance Tech had options of where to race post-PC — some would have been cheaper — the team made the choice French had hoped and moved into the premier division of American sportscar racing, IMSA’s Prototype class.
The Weather Tech Sports Car Championship season opens with the Rolex 24 at Daytona, beginning at 1:40 p.m. Saturday on the infield
road course at Daytona International Speedway in Daytona Beach, Fla.
For French, the differences between his old car and new one are obvious. This year’s has a roof (unlike the open cockpit that made last year’s raindrenched Daytona even more miserable), plus a more advanced suspension and 120 more horsepower that make it easier for a prototype driver to pick his way through the slower productionbased GT cars.
“In a way you don’t really have the same sensation of speed because you don’t have the wind in your face, right?” French said from the track. “Probably less fatiguing on the neck, which is nice.
“Before you had to sort of time your passes and be more aggressive under braking just to get around just one GT car. Whereas now you’ve got so much top speed you can pass three or four on the same straightaway with ease. Nice!”
Daytona brings out the best. In addition to the series regulars including Cadillac stalwarts Joao Barbosa and Jordan Taylor, Pipo Derani and Ryan Dalziel of the ESM Nissan program and the new Penske Racing Acura effort involving Castroneves and Montoya, the Rolex draws such drivers as two-time Formula One world champion Fernando Alonso and IndyCar champions Simon Pagenaud and Ryan HunterReay.
While the thought of that competition hits a nerve for the young racing fan that still resides within French, it’s also a reminder of the possibilities.
If French and the team do everything right, he’ll be in position to fight that tough field for the overall victory this weekend in one of the most prestigious races in the world and to earn a Rolex to match the one he slid on his left wrist last winter.
“All the teams are pretty well stacked with drivers and a lot of cars,” French said. “In this sort of a race, 24 hours, if you’re on the lead lap in the last hour, you did an amazing job. If you can make it 23 hours without any major mistakes or penalties or anything of that sort, it’s been a good day. Then if you’ve gotten to that point, it’s basically a sprint to the finish.
“But if you can be in that fight at the end, that’s the expectation. There’s no reason we shouldn’t be able to get there.”
On the schedule
Although Ty Majeski won't make his debut in the Roush Fenway Ford Development Xfinity Series car until April, the Seymour native is scheduled for the marquee Charlotte oval and "roval" events and his home race.
Majeski, 23, of Seymour, is set for 12 starts in the No. 60 Mustang he’ll share with Austin Cindric and Chase Briscoe, the first of them April 14 at Bristol Motor Speedway. Other tracks on his schedule include Talladega Superspeedway, NASCAR’s longest track; Iowa Speedway, where he made two of his three Xfinity starts last year, and Road America in Elkhart Lake on Aug. 25.
Then there’s Charlotte. Majeski will race on the traditional oval May 26 and then the temporary layout that blends the oval and infield road course Sept. 21.
Never say never
Two-time Formula One world champion Fernando Alonso, who ran the Indianapolis 500 last season, also stopped in the NASCAR epicenter in Charlotte, N.C., during preseason media activities and admitted to being intrigued and open to a stock-car test someday.
“From the outside, races are great because they’re all in a group,” Alonso told reporters. “It’s not predictable at all. Until the last lap, you don’t know what’s going to happen.”